Introduction and Interest in Contributing to NumFOCUS

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Ahana Acharya

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Dec 20, 2025, 11:11:34 PM12/20/25

to NumFOCUS GSOC

Hello NumFOCUS Team,

My name is Ahana, and I am a 3rd-year Btech student interested in contributing to projects under the NumFOCUS umbrella, with the goal of applying for Google Summer of Code 2026 and continuing as a long-term contributor.

My primary technical background is in Python, with a focus on AI/ML, data analysis, and scientific computing workflows. I have also completed a research-oriented internship at IISER, where I worked in an academic environment that emphasized careful experimentation, structured analysis, and understanding existing research code and methodologies. This experience strengthened my interest in research-driven, open-source scientific software.

Through my academic and personal projects, I have worked on data preprocessing, model evaluation, and visualization, with an emphasis on writing modular, readable code and gradually extending existing codebases rather than building everything from scratch. ArviZ’s focus on Bayesian model diagnostics, evaluation, and visualization is what particularly drew me to the NumFOCUS ecosystem.

I’d really appreciate guidance on a few points:

Are there specific areas within the ArviZ codebase that are particularly suitable for first-time contributors with a Python + ML/data background?
Do maintainers generally recommend starting with documentation, tests, or small refactors before moving toward more core features?
From a mentor’s perspective, what kinds of early contributions best demonstrate readiness for GSoC within ArviZ?

I’m happy to start with smaller tasks, learn the ecosystem properly, and build consistent contributions over time. Thank you for supporting such impactful open-source scientific projects, and I would love to contribute meaningfully to the NumFOCUS community.